In his recent BBC series Wild Isles, David Attenborough described chalk streams as “one of the rarest habitats on Earth”. Chalk streams are under serious threat and with 85 per cent of them located in England, "the eyes of the world are on this most English and deceptively idyllic of battlegrounds".
This is our fantastic chalk stream – the Little Stour near its source at Well Chapel, Littlebourne. It represents a thread connecting the villages and has a great history dating back to Roman times.
Our Sponsors - the 4 Villages Post Office
The Project
The Little Stour Monitoring Project “Save Our Little Stour” project is generously being Sponsored by the 4 Villages Post Office and Village Shop Association Ltd. whose objectives of are to sustain, encourage, provide, facilitate or resuscitate organisations, facilities and other groups for the benefit of the community of the Four Villages (Littlebourne, Wickhambreaux, Ickham and Stodmarsh). Having established a vibrant shop and post office, the Association has surplus funds each year available for these organisations to apply for Sponsorship.
For more information about this project, including full data on water quality and survey findings, please contact Tim Bostock via the Contacts link.
Some recent articles on the Little Stour and development threats
'...A naturally replenishing, remarkably stable habitat with huge biodiversity'
Feargal Sharkey
When I came to England (says Feargal Sharkey on Chalk Streams) it was a bit of a shock. Why, I thought, would anyone want to sit by a canal to catch roach? Then I realised there were these things called chalk streams, with springs of the cleanest, most pristine water on the planet, welling at a constant cool temperature and constant rate of flow; a naturally replenishing, remarkably stable habitat with huge biodiversity.